ll directors are inevitably asked why
they wanted to become a funeral
director. According to the 841 students
participating in this year’s NFDA Funeral
Service
Student
Expectations
Study,
the main reason was they “want to
help people,” cited by two-thirds of
respondents. Placing second was “honor/
care for the deceased’’ (59.2%) and funeral
service was a “calling” or “they’d always
wanted to do this” (53.8%). These three
reasons form a consistent thread through
past surveys as the top reasons students
decided to enter funeral service programs.
Also cited were:
• Learn techniques/industry: 34%
• Want to own a funeral home someday: 33.8%
• Get a license/degree: 30.6%
• Personal experience at a funeral home: 29.3%
• Interested in science: 27%
• Job security: 24.7%
• Get a job/change careers: 19.6%
• Previous experience at funeral home: 14.2%
• School reputation: 13.6%
“TO
HELP
PEOPLE”
CITED AS TOP
REASON STUDENTS
ENROLLED IN
FUNERAL SERVICE
SCHOOL
By Deana Gillespie
and Edward J. Defort, USA
Other key findings
Funeral service seems to be trending away from
the multigenerational business it once was. Of note,
having family in the business was cited by just 9.5%
of respondents.
Further supporting this trend are the most recent
statistics from the American Board of Funeral Service
Education (ABFSE), which found that in 2021, only
9.4% of new enrollees had a parent in the business,
1.1% had a spouse, 0.8% a sibling, 0.7% an inlaw, and
2.5% said “other” relative. ABFSE data identify this as
a consistent trend. In 2018, 13% of all new enrollees
were carrying on or entering the family business;
the figure was nearly 18% in 2017.
The most and least expected job responsibilities
students plan to have at a funeral home have
remained essentially the same over the past
three survey waves. Once hired, they expect to be
embalming (89.2%), arranging funerals (86.8%),
directing funerals (85.4%) and doing removals
(80.4%). At the bottom of the list were fleet
No. 99 – AUTUMN 2022 | THANOS MAGAZINE
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